Developing Writing for Photo Projects

Instructor: George Weld | Tuition: $395 (Members) $465 (Non-Members) | Dates: Thursdays, September 18 - October 23 | Time: 6 - 8 PM ET | Class Size Max: 8

from $372.00

Course Overview

Integrating writing into a photo project presents unique challenges—how do images and text relate to one another? What is the most effective way to present them together? And most importantly, how can photographers elevate their writing to match the strength of their photographs?

This 6-week online class is designed to help photographers develop their image-text work by focusing on language as a material and examining how it functions on its own and in combination with images. Through workshops, guided readings, and discussions, students will produce an image-text zine or chapbook, using new work or a project they've been developing. Suitable for photographers at any stage of their project, this course supports a range of writing styles, from research-based nonfiction to lyrical prose. Those working on focused, book-oriented projects will find it especially rewarding.

Images © Raymond Meeks and George Weld, The Inhabitants

If your desired tuition option is unavailable, please email info@penumbrafoundation.org and we will do our best to accommodate you. If the entire class is sold out, we can add you to the waitlist.


George Weld works in writing, photography, and food. He is the co-author, with Raymond Meeks, of The Inhabitants (Mack, 2023), co-author, with Evan Hanczor, of Breakfast (Rizzoli, 2015) and a contributor to the books New York Diaries (Modern Library, 2012), The New Brooklyn Cookbook (Morrow, 2010), Raymond Meeks’s Ciprian Honey Cathedral (Mack 2020), and Adrianna Ault’s Levee (Void 2023). His writing about photography, food, and poetry has appeared in Trigger, New York Review of Books, Lucky Peach, Agni, Edible Brooklyn, and the Boston Book Review. He was the invited writer for the Journal of Grievances, vol 4 (Antics Press, 2022), edited by Judith Black and the ImageThreads Collective. 

He has a master’s degree in Creative Writing from Boston University, where he studied with Derek Walcott and Robert Pinsky before doing graduate work in literature at the University of Virginia. He lives in the Hudson Valley.